


Prelude to Armageddon

by fawatson



Category: The Charioteer - Mary Renault
Genre: Backstory, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-17
Updated: 2014-07-17
Packaged: 2018-02-09 07:37:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1974420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fawatson/pseuds/fawatson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of linked ficlets and drabbles focusing on Laurie's time with the BEF prior to the Nazi invasion of France.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prelude to Armageddon

**Author's Note:**

> **Originally posted to:** maryrenaultfics at LiveJournal in instalments from 03/09/2012 to 31/12/2012   
> **Originally written for:** ‘An apple for teacher’ challenge, Autumn 2012  
>  **Prompt:** Apple  
>  **Disclaimer:** I do not own these characters and make no profit from them.  
>  **Author’s Note:** Germany invaded Poland on 01/09/2012; Britain declared war on Sunday 03/09/2012. Between September 1939 and May 1940, the British Expeditionary Force saw little action in France, leading to the nickname “the Phoney War”.

Part One

“What do you think it will feel like?” Simon asked. 

“ _What_ will feel like?” Laurie asked back. 

“Killing a man.” 

The question came out of the blue. He and Simon had been enjoying a rare sunny afternoon together by the brook. They didn’t often have the chance these days. Simon had gone to Leeds Agricultural for two years; Laurie had fulfilled his mother’s fondest hopes when he won a place at Oxford. Having finished his course in the spring, Simon was now working full-time on his father’s farm; late summer was his busiest time of year. Laurie was enjoying the long vacation before going back to start his final year in October; for him, summer was the time of laziness and self-indulgence. He and Gyp had roamed far most days. When it had simply rained too hard even for Gyp to want a walk, he had curled up in the wingchair by the fire and read – for pleasure, instead of swotting for a paper he had to write – with his mother, periodically, bringing him cups of tea and slices of Mrs Timmings’ Victoria sponge. 

Today, however, Simon had been allowed a rare day off from work, and the two young men had taken a packed lunch, and their dogs, up to the moors for a long walk. Gyp had bounded after Sally, sniffing eagerly at her bottom whenever she let him get close. 

“She’s coming into heat again,” Laure had remarked. 

“No – too old,” Simon had shaken his head. “Her whelping days are long since done.”

They had walked past the circle of stones at the apex of the hill, and down through a cleft to the next valley, heading for the little copse by the stream, where they had spent many a day in times past. Lunch first –corned beef sandwiches, apples, and Eccles cakes, washed down with ginger beer – and then both young men had set a line. Typically, Simon had brought a proper creel; typically he quickly caught two of the brown speckled trout. With quick efficiency he used a stone to stun them, before unhooking and popping them quickly in the basket. All Laurie caught were minnows – and he threw those back. 

“You can’t even kill a fish, Laurie,” remarked Simon, “how will you kill a man?” 

“Maybe it won’t come,” Laurie said. “Maybe we’ll be able to reach a settlement. It’s not too late.” 

Simon shook his head. “It’ll come. Herr Hitler’s aching for a fight – he’ll not step back from the brink now.” Simon looked across the little brook to the fields of harvested corn beyond- neat stooks drying in the sun. His fields – well his father’s really – but they’d be his in due course. This land of beauty, of plenty – _home_. 

“Will you go, Simon?” asked Laurie. 

“Of course!” said Simon, “Why do you ask?”

“You’re a farmer – you’ll be protected. They’ll not call you up.” Inside Laurie thought he’d give almost anything not to have to go; but he supposed he’d have to in the end. One couldn’t shirk, after all. 

“I wouldn’t want to miss the show,” came the laconic reply.

* * * * *

Lucy hummed happily to herself as she hung out the washing. Three more weeks before Laurie went back to Oriel – three more weeks in which to patch the elbows of his corduroy jacket and darn that hole he’d pushed through the big toe of his woollen socks. One chore done, two more to go, but she didn’t mind a bit. He was a good son. She always knew herself fortunate in her Laurie. 

The clock in the hallway chimed the hour as she buttered a scone. Automatically she turned on the wireless. But her favourite programme had been pre-empted by an announcement – a horrible announcement. Poland invaded - surely not! And after Mr Chamberlain had promised peace only last year!

* * * * *

It was a long queue, snaking back for yards behind him. By the time he got to the front, Laurie’s back ached from standing too long. The greying sergeant asked a few simple questions, jotted the answers on a sheet of grainy paper, which he turned round to show Laurie. 

“Sign here.” The pen he was handed had already been dipped in the inkwell. 

 

Part Two

She’d sent him more socks. Laurie smiled, as he opened the parcel from home. One pair grey, one pair dark green – both woollen. There was another, smaller, shape inside the main parcel. He unwrapped the tissue to find a pair of gloves knitted in a colourful pattern, with a small label pinned to them, ‘from Aunt Olive.’ He thought he would have known that even without the note. For as long as he could remember she had made him just such a pair each Autumn , using the odds and ends of wool left over from other projects. Laurie tucked both socks and gloves into the locker at the end of his bunk, before taking the letter outside. He crossed the compound heading for the canteen, where he collected a large mug of tea and a thick ham sandwich, and a piece of apple pie, which he took back outside to sit at a table under a beech tree. The tea had stewed till it was bitter but was welcome nonetheless. He took several sips, scalding his mouth in the process, then swiftly demolished the sandwich and pie, before lighting a cigarette, and unfolding the letter from home. 

It wasn’t long. Mother wrote every week, so there was never a great deal different about any of her letters. This one told of Aunt Olive’s latest visit (now ended, although she almost missed her train), some mischief one of the choirboys had got up to (which had scandalised old Mrs Ramsay), and her decision to add a vegetable patch to the back garden. It ended with her usual exhortations to keep his feet dry. (Apparently that was very important in the trenches, or so his dead Uncle Raymond whom he’d never met had said, back in the last war). Laurie looked across the base which spread round him: nary a trench in sight, just row upon row of tents. He had written to say there were no trenches. Maybe the censor had deleted it. 

 

Part Three

Most of ‘A’ company had been given a day’s leave – all except those few on punishment detail – and most had chosen to head into the nearest town in search of entertainment. Wine, women and song accompanied by his squad – all undoubtedly rather the worse for drink (and inevitably crude with it) hadn’t appealed, however. The day had promised to be fine. Mornings, now, had that Autumn crispness to them; but the sky had been bright blue and the sun’s warmth normally made afternoons very pleasant. So Laurie had made his excuses. The other men thought he was sweet on a girl back home – thought him rather ‘wet’ not to take advantage of the distance between them – but were tolerant of this, as of other differences. Laurie had equipped himself with a bottle of water, convinced Cook to let him have some sandwiches (inevitably ham – it seemed all they had had for weeks), and taken himself off to meander through country lanes and pathways. He missed Gyp acutely; a walk wasn’t a proper ramble without a dog. But it was still enjoyable. He’d stopped, he thought, somewhere south-west of the town, having deliberately skirted the Air Force compound to the west of his own Army base. He found a beech tree at the edge of a farmer’s field to sit beneath. He’d worked up an appetite in two hours, and made short work of the sandwiches before eating two apples, windfalls he’d picked up along the way. Laurie used his handkerchief to wipe the stickiness of apple juice from his hands and mouth, before he turned to his book. As always, he took a few moments over Ralph’s inscription to him, remembering the way those grey eyes had seemed to look right through to his heart, before he turned to the text. He flipped over to a page, dog-eared for easy location, and somewhat worn from repeated reading.

_... the two unruly horses, taking the souls off their guard, will bring them together and seize upon and accomplish that which is by the many accounted blissful; and when this has once been done, they continue the practice, but infrequently, since what they are doing is not approved by the whole mind. So these two pass through life as friends...._

Friends....

 

Part Four

Laurie wasn’t sure whether it was the chill that set in as the afternoon wore on which woke him, or the irritating whine above. At first, groggy from his nap, Laurie didn’t realise what it was and batted his hand at the fly he heard buzzing in his ear. But there was nothing there; waking more fully, he realised there was no fly. He was stiff and cold. In the three weeks since he’d last walked this way the weather had chilled; even the afternoon sun didn’t warm properly now. Above him a lone plane climbed, then rolled, then dipped. 

>>>

Bim laughed aloud as he climbed once more – up, up, up! Then over – loop the loop – a roll – a dive. The brightness of sun to the west made him bank sharp right; then he climbed again, high into the clouds. He wasn’t supposed to take the plane out so late. Well...what of it – there were a lot of things he wasn’t supposed to do. A tiny figure in army fatigues, below by the edge of the field, stood and stretched. He pretended to dive bomb towards it, pulling up before he got too close to the trees. This was joy!

 

Part Five

 

It did seem a little hard to come so close to Paris and not see anything, Laurie thought. He wondered how much longer they had to go – and whether tonight would see them to base or just to some stopping point along the way. It had been a very long day. First a long train trip – then the crossing Dover to Calais (the weather had been a foul and half the company had been sick) – now this. He peeked out past the flap of the troop transport. There was snow on the ground (in November!); his feet were _bloody_ cold. 

>>>

Lucy ticked the afghan round her legs to protect from drafts, took a sip of tea, then opened Olive’s letter. 

_I was quite shocked to hear Laurie’s been posted – with so little warning! Only three days leave! I _do_ think the people who run the military could have been a  little more _sensitive_ to a mother’s feelings. We shall sorely miss Laurie at Christmas (it’s always so nice to have a man to put the star at the top of the tree). _

Lucy shook her head - the Army being considerate – really Olive was _too_ silly for words.

 

Part Six

Laurie dropped one peeled potato into the large pot to his right, before reaching into the burlap sack for another. Automatically he started peeling. Jack, beside him, was similarly peeling a small mountain of fruit– no doubt intended for yet another apple pie. This wasn’t exactly how he had envisaged war: kitchen duty. Overhead, a wide ‘V’ formation of airplanes headed off across the border. He’d felt a short flurry of excitement when the raids had started, thinking them the start – finally – of the long-awaited military campaign against Germany. But when he’d mentioned this to an RAF officer he’d encountered in town, the man had just laughed at him. Only a propaganda campaign, he’d said, and shown Laurie one of leaflets. 

 

Part Seven

Laurie was smiling as he finished the letter from home. There was no exciting news – no great plans revealed within it. It had just been full of the trivia of daily life at home, and the baking being done for Christmas. (His mother had lamented the difficulty in getting lemon peel for the plum pudding.) It was still rather early to be decorating; but nonetheless, he could picture how the sitting room would look in a week or two. There would be boughs of holly bedecking the mantel over the fire, cut from the shrub that was actually in the neighbour’s garden, but from which, since it leaned over into their own, they felt free to take. (It did need pruning, after all, was the refrain he remembered his mother saying each year.) In the southwest corner of the room would be a small pine tree in its bucket of moist earth (so it didn’t die). Putting it there, meant the curio cabinet would have to be moved, so the room would look very crowded. But Christmas wasn’t Christmas without a tree. Mum would have brought up lights and garlands and glass baubles from the cellar. He’d always loved the special set shaped to look like fruit: a bunch of purple grapes; a yellow and green pear; a bright red apple; and an orange, dusted with gold sparkles. Once Twelfth Night was done, the baubles would be packed away carefully in storage for another year; and the tree would go back outside, dug into the back garden to grow another inch before being lifted again to do its Christmas duty again the following year. (He supposed, someday soon, it would be too big to lift.) All the cards received from friends and relatives would be strung on red ribbon on the walls. If he had a chance, this year, for the first time, a card from him would be amongst them, assuming the French sent cards, that is. Laurie wasn’t quite sure if they did. Still, he could have a look next time he was given a pass into town. Hopefully there would be something to buy for family at home.

 

Part Eight

Everyone in the camp had been given a few days leave for the holidays, gradually. People who had been there longest either went for Christmas or New Year; the last group had gone last night and would be back on the 2nd. Newer members of the regiment, those only recently posted to France, had been given a few days between the holidays. Laurie’s squad had been giddy with delight anticipating their conquest of the country’s capital – or more accurately – its ladies. They may have spoken in jest about ‘les dames’ on their infrequent passes while still stationed in England (more usually spent in the nearest pub). They meant it for real now. Soldiers’ mythology had French women prettier, better dressed, and more sophisticated than their English brethren, which to the average Tommy meant faster. Far from their loved ones the men meant to test this. Back on kitchen duty after leave, Laurie peeled potatoes on auto-pilot as he reviewed the delights of his three day pass.

* * * * * * *

Against his better judgement Laurie had been persuaded to join a group of squad mates who were starting their evening by taking in the show at the Moulin Rouge. Laurie had found himself deeply embarrassed by the time it had ended. Not by the women on stage, whose beauty lived up to legend; scanty their costumes might be, but only somewhat more revealing than the form fitting tights and leotards of the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo which he remembered from before the war. It had been his compatriots’ drunkenness and lewd whistles which offended. Laurie made excuses as the cabaret emptied, deliberately heading off in another direction while they waited at the stage door. He had little doubt of the frosty reception they would get there. They wouldn’t linger; their irrepressible high spirits would soon lead them to some venue with beer and more accessible girls. Now was the time to make his exit.

Laurie wandered without really noticing direction, though generally uphill. Relatively soon he stood at the foot of the hill to Sacre Coeur. Impressive by daylight its pale shape appeared to loom even more massive against the night sky. He turned back, retracing his path to Abbesses, and gave a few centimes to a beggar sheltering on the steps, before getting the Metro back to the cheap hotel where he had a room. He stopped off at the local bar at the end of the road for a last drink of the evening. A sign advertised cider; but he found it rough stuff compared with what he was used to and left half of it. It wouldn’t do to be too late, he thought; the concierge had made a point of explaining when the door was locked. She smiled her approval at him as he entered well within time. 

The next morning, while the others in his squad were nursing their heads, Laurie was up and out quickly, heading for the sights he had long wanted to see. He had spent the rest of his pass visiting museums or just wandering round the Left Bank. Two days had passed quickly enough, and given ample opportunity to experiment with French cuisine (snails were definitely overrated). Soon Laurie was joining the transport back to base, listening to exaggerated stories of sexual conquest from the other chaps on the lorry as they jolted along country roads. They clearly had visited a very different city from the one whose acquaintance he had made.

* * * * * * *

The pile of potato peelings grew to his left; the white pieces filled huge saucepans to his right. Pomme-de-terre to the French, kartoffeln to the Germans; he wasn't sure what the word was in Italian. It was his contribution to the war effort, it seemed. Laurie wondered how the war would change Paris. If it went on long enough, he supposed he would go again next leave, though by then it might well be changed. He supposed the museums would soon be stripped of their art work, placed for safekeeping in storage. The lip-service paid to blackout regulations would undoubtedly change once the war really got started. For now though, he had seen the City of Light in all its glory. It helped to know what one was fighting for. 


End file.
